PESHAWAR, Pakistan (London Post) December, 19 – Several Pakistani Taliban detainees overwhelmed security guards, disarmed police, took hostages and took control of the facility overnight at a counterterrorism centre in northwestern Pakistan. an official said on Monday.
The incident occurred late Sunday and quickly escalated into a standoff. Pakistani officials later confirmed that a counterterrorism officer had been killed during the occupation of a detention centre in Bannu, a district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province and part of a former tribal area.
Police and military have made efforts to deploy troops and special forces in the area, but as of noon on Monday, about 12 hours later, kidnappings were still underway. Official figures show at least 30 Taliban fighters. personnel were involved in the takeover and may have had up to 10 hostages. The brazen move reflected the government’s inability to control remote areas along its border with Afghanistan. Pakistan’s Taliban are a separate group, but US and NATO forces are in the final stages of pulling out of Afghanistan. It is also allied with the Taliban of Afghanistan, which seized power in neighbouring countries last year.
Few other details have been released about the takeover, which appears to have happened while police were questioning Taliban detainees, according to state government spokesman Mohammad Ali Saif.
Authorities are negotiating with some relatives of Taliban militants, security officials told the Associated Press. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to reporters. Officials said soldiers were among the hostages. There were concerns that the military could storm the facility if negotiations failed. In his message, a video circulating on social media, the hostage taker threatened to kill the officer if the safe passage was not obtained.
Pakistani Taliban spokesman Mohammad Kurasani, also known as Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan or TTP, said some of the kidnappers had been imprisoned in Bannu for years. He was a member of the TTP. said there is.
Since then, the TTP’s top leadership and fighters have gone into hiding in neighbouring Afghanistan, while militants still rule relatively freely in parts of the province. Initially, in a video message posted on social media, the hostage-takers demanded an airlift to Afghanistan, but Khurasani was aware the group was dead due to the long detention of the TTP fighters. It said the request was made unintentionally because it was not. He “controls” parts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa near the Afghan border.
Pakistan’s Taliban have stepped up attacks on security forces after unilaterally ending a months-long ceasefire with the Pakistani government last month. It strains the relationship between
The TTP has led rebels in Pakistan for the past 15 years, fighting for strict enforcement of Islamic law in the country, the release of members in government custody, and a reduction in the presence of Pakistani forces in the country’s former tribal areas. ing.
